200K people on NYC Section 8 housing voucher waitlist.

NEW YORK CITY (PIX11) -- Some 200,000 lucky New Yorkers will soon find out they made it onto the city's Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher waitlist.

Applicants were randomly selected from a pool of 633,808 applicants for the waitlist, city officials said Thursday. Selected applicants will receive notification by email this week and subsequently by mail, according to NYCHA representatives.

The city started accepting applications for the program in June for the first time since 2009. Since then, the city has been working on getting out just over 210,000 vouchers. Last year, the city doled out just over 7,500 vouchers, according to representatives of NYCHA.

The federally funded program offers rental subsidies to low-income families looking for private market housing. Soon, NYCHA will start giving out 1,000 vouchers per month, according to Deputy Mayor Maria Torres-Springer.

"The message is clear: New Yorkers need affordable housing and they [need] it need now,” Mayor Eric Adams said.

The city received over 630,000 applicants in just a week-long application period, nearly half of which came in the first 24 hours.

Emily Rahhal is a digital reporter from Los Angeles who has covered New York City since 2023. She joined PIX11 in 2024. See more of her work here and follow her on Twitter here.